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1 - Introduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2013

Martin Hilpert
Affiliation:
Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland
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Summary

Constructions and language change

This book outlines an approach to language change from the perspective of Construction Grammar. The idea of ‘constructional change’ will be developed as a new way of looking at diachronic processes in language. The following chapters present several case studies from the history of English in order to illustrate what processes of change come together in the development of grammatical constructions, and how the adoption of a constructional perspective can deepen our understanding of grammatical change. Naturally, an undertaking of this kind has to justify why a new term – constructional change – is introduced to group together formal and functional processes of change that affect constructions. As will be discussed, many of these are in fact quite well understood individually, and some of them are already grouped together under the heading of grammaticalization (Hopper and Traugott 2003). In what cases should we speak of constructional change rather than use established terminology? This book is an attempt to formulate a comprehensive answer to this question and to offer example analyses in which the theoretical concept of a changing, developing construction yields a shift in perspective, thus revealing issues that were previously not amenable to analysis.

The general idea of constructional change is of course not new. In fact, it has gained fairly wide currency over the past years and work on its theoretical status, similar in spirit to the present study, is underway (Bybee 2010, Trousdale 2010). Much recent work on language change, especially research with a functional orientation, focuses on the level of grammatical constructions (Bergs and Diewald 2008, Traugott and Trousdale 2010).

Type
Chapter
Information
Constructional Change in English
Developments in Allomorphy, Word Formation, and Syntax
, pp. 1 - 25
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

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  • Introduction
  • Martin Hilpert, Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland
  • Book: Constructional Change in English
  • Online publication: 05 May 2013
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139004206.001
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  • Introduction
  • Martin Hilpert, Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland
  • Book: Constructional Change in English
  • Online publication: 05 May 2013
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139004206.001
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Introduction
  • Martin Hilpert, Université de Neuchâtel, Switzerland
  • Book: Constructional Change in English
  • Online publication: 05 May 2013
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139004206.001
Available formats
×